Celebrate the fall with the Corn

Last week our Little hands were busy making this Corn Craft. So simple to make with the available materials at hand and sure this would be a super hit with your kids. A great activity to be a part of the 'Busy Hands Series'. I want to post this craft before the fall season comes to an end, as in our place already the duration of daylight is getting noticeably shorter. 

Materials used:

• Split Yellow Peas (for the kernels)
• Construction Paper - Preferably Green, Yellow and White
• White Glue and Glue stick
• Scissors, Pencil

First, roughly draw elongated shape on the yellow and white paper for the corn kernels and the husk. Now glue the yellow piece on the center of the green paper. Make a slit in the middle of white paper half way through and bend both the parts outwards as shown in the pic. 

Glue it over the yellow kernel part. You can also make this husk part with the green paper and use the white paper for Background. It might look more attractive.

And now all the paper work is over. Till this part I made and LO did rest of the work. Mean while LO was busy arranging the beans around the yellow corn. Truly this is a fine motor activity.

Apply the white glue and spread the yellow split peas over it. 

Allow it to dry for sometime.

Have a try and let me know how the kids enjoyed it. 

Add-on ideas:

• You can discuss about the fall season, the harvests and the Thanksgiving day. 
• Discuss parts of the corn like kernels and husk.

Happy Parenting😊

Form a Circle - Fine motor activity for Busy Hands

This basic shape activity will pave the way for kids to explore and create with shapes. The activity involves placing tiny objects like colored gems, buttons, pulses, stones or other small tokens along the edge of any circular object. Kids learn to recognize the shape and other attributes of it, like what the particular shape look like and how to make them.

Here we are introducing the basics of math and also fine motor and coordination skills, as kids are picking up and placing the bean onto the board using the pincer grasp action.

You will need a circular object and any beans. You can use plates or container lids or even a paper with a circle on it or a circular board like the one we used. 

LO was playing with brown beans and vehicles. The floor was messy with the beans everywhere. To make him clean up the mess I encouraged him to do this activity and it worked out!😜 All the beans went into the dump truck to ease the activity!

I showed him to how to make circle with beans and he fairly did a decent job!

LO wanted to try the same with the shapes beads!

Happy Parenting 😊

Busy Hands at Process art

This time we explored the colors in an unprocessed manner! Yes, we did Process Art this time, with Pine cones, Lollipop and Pom Poms. Process Art belongs to the child. It allows the child to predict, plan, problem solve, and express their thoughts and feelings. Its is entirely their own creation. They use their small motor skills to manipulate the materials and create their masterpiece. LO loved this Process Art and it was completely funtastic! 😊

Materials used:

• Kids washable paint
• Pine Cones
• Pom Poms
• Lollipop!
• White Papers

I chose Pom poms first, since they are absolutely soft in texture!! (Silly me!😊) More over they create amazing patterns with colors. LO wanted to make some flowers with them, so I drew a plant and he stamped different colored flowers with Pom poms. He didn't forget to complete the plant with brown stem!

The next (tool) which we chose to explore with is the Pine Cones. You can't forget the Pine Cones in this absolutely magical Fall season🌲. This is the first time LO trying around with a Pine Cone, so I didn't want to interrupt with his own way of handling it. He dabbed the cone on to the paper with colors on and tried to fill a square!

This one is a completely new category we chose to color with. Yeah, its Lollipop🍭. Ours was white in color, so it didn't create its own pattern. But if you choose to use colored Lollipops, you can explore them painting on paper just with little water and no colors! It would create amazing patterns. We will try to do one in near future. 

The last tool used was LO's busy hands! LO ran out of patience and couldn't restrain himself from making a mess with his fingers😉.It was beautiful to watch the colors get mix along with the little fingers. And yeah we also did Hand Printing.

Happy Parenting!😊

Pipe Cleaner Activity for Little Busy Hands

As I mentioned in my previous post we are set out with series of fine motor activities that would keep your little ones' little hands busy for hours. And this Pipe Cleaner activity is a perfect one. Chenille stems, or the pipe cleaners, can be bent into any shape and are thin enough to string beads too. I love them because they come in different colors and even glitter, sparkly pipe cleaners are available and fairly inexpensive.

This activity is so simple to set up, all you need is pipe cleaners and a colander. 

Turn your colander upside down and show your kiddo how to insert the pipe cleaners into the holes of the colander. 

LO was very curious in taking out a new pipe cleaner out of the pack than inserting them in the colander😁

 

LO loved the versatility of the pipe cleaners and its soft texture. He loved bending them into different shapes. He associated each color with an animal and he had his own story for each of them😁

 

 We also tried pulling the pipe cleaners out of the colander.

And finally cleanup!!

It was a complete fun filled fine motor activity with learning the colors and some imaginative play. 

Happy Parenting!😊

Busy Hands : Alphabet Fine Motor Play

Super excited to write the first post on "Busy Hands Series". In this series we will concentrate on fine motor activities for toddlers and preschoolers. Important caution: Materials used or suggested in this series may include small items and children are most likely to choke on small objects when they're between 6 months and 3 years old. Hence adult supervision is required all the time when doing these kinda activities with your kids.

The importance of fine motor skill is a well known fact and I need not discuss about that in this space. And remember 'Every child is different', and they develop differently.

This activity was initiated by LO and I just clicked the photos. You need a foam alphabet puzzle and grab some pile of whatever you have to fill the letters. We used red beans but you could use beads, dry split beans, corn kernels, dry beans or any other small item.

You can use this activity to practice letter recognition. You can call out a letter and ask your preschooler to fill the letter with beads/ beans.

Fine motor skills aid in the growth of intelligence and develop continuously throughout the stages in human development.

Happy Parenting😊